In a mobile communication network, a base station (Radio Access Network (RAN), RAN node, EUTRAN, ENB, or Node B) has to transmit and/or receive data to and/or from a User Equipment (UE) by using limited frequency resources. When the number of users in a cell controlled by an RAN node is increased and/or traffic transmitted and/or received by a UE is increased, a congestion status may occur in the RAN. In order to manage such a RAN congestion status (hereinafter used interchangeably with the term “user plane congestion status”) without deteriorating the Quality of Service (QoS) experienced by a user, congestion control taking account of user characteristics and/or service applications is needed. A system component capable of independently performing such a congestion status management operation may include a UE, a communication network, and a server that transmit traffic.
In general, when a server transmits the content requested by a user, traffic transmitted to a UE arrives at the UE over an operator network, if the user or the server is not aware that the operator network's RAN is under congestion, and requests or attempts to transmit more data than the data transmittable over the RAN, then the data cannot be properly transferred to a UE, and the QoS experienced by the user may deteriorate significantly.
As an example of a situation where this problem may arise, consider a case in which a UE receives a video from a content server and plays back the received video. When a data rate of 100 kbps is needed by the video in spite of the fact that only a data rate of 50 kbps may be provided to the UE due to RAN congestion, the video buffer may become empty, leading to frequent pauses of the video. This problem may frequently arise in the wireless mobile communication environment in which videos are played by smart phones, and therefore there is a need for a solution to the problem.
Accordingly, a method and apparatus for controlling a congestion status such that a non-disrupted service may be provided to a User Equipment (UE) when the congestion status occurs in a network is desired.
The above information is presented as background information only to assist with an understanding of the present disclosure. No determination has been made, and no assertion is made, as to whether any of the above might be applicable as prior art with regard to the present disclosure.